We spent the next hour or so rolling through the Black Hills National Forest, on our way to Wyoming.
Wyoming was beautiful. The high plains has one of the lowest population densities in the continental US. Nothing but oil fields and livestock. We rolled through towns with populations in double digits, and eventually made it to Big Horn National Forest. Elevation ranges from 5,000 meters to 13,000 meters. We really felt how high up we were when we stopped to let the dog out. There was snow over the hill, and it was quite cold. The phenomena of seeing snow at the end of June will get you every time. We played in the snow for a few minutes, checked out the vegetation, and got back on the road.
Our plan was to make it to Thermopolis, Wy and camp. Thermopolis is aptly named for its hot springs. The springs are open free to the public. When we arrived at Thermopolis, we were disappointed. The only camping spots were in open fields next to a bunch of RVs. That's not our vision of true camping, and we didn't want to set our tent out next to a noisy RV. We wanted to be in the wild. We continued on into the Wind River Canyon. The end of the canyon spits you out at Boysen State Park. We decided to camp there. We were next to the Wind River, and looking at red-striped mountains. We soon learned why it's called the WIND river. Around 11pm the wind started kicking up and almost blew our tent in on us. The sheer noise from the wind would not allow us to sleep, and Henry was quite unnerved by the whole experience. I looked out of the tent to see a storm in the distance. We decided to pack all our things up and sleep in the car. It took us quite a bit of time in that wind. I almost lost the tent twice while we were taking it down, and we only had one headlamp to work with. We load everything up, crouch awkwardly in the front seats and try to sleep.
We didn't sleep that well, and we essentially paid to sleep in our car. Thanks Wind River.
After a hellish night, we were on our way to see Grand Teton National Park and Yellowstone National Park.
6/26/11
The Tetons are out of this world. 13,000 Ft up and snow-covered, rocky and HUGE. We drove through Jackson Hole and witnessed our first Buffalo of the trip. We drove through the Tetons to get to Yellowstone. All along the roadway were signs warning us of animals in the area. We were stoked! We arrived at Yellowstone and immediately understood why it was our first national park. it is majestic. Huge waterfalls, geysers, hot springs, fast rivers, deep canyons, elk, moose, buffalo, and bears! Just stunning!
What we didn't realize was how large Yellowstone actually is. We only had time to go through half of the park due to inadequate planning. We did end up seeing quite a few herd of Buffalo. One Buffalo almost got in our car! Sarah had the passenger window rolled down taking pictures, and all of a sudden from 6 feet away, the Buffalo starts moving toward the window. I shut the window rapidly, almost catching Sarah's hand in the window. It was a pretty cool experience to be that close. We also got to see Old Faithful.
Did you know that there are 500 known geysers in the world and half of them reside in Yellowstone? Old Faithful is neither the biggest geyser or the most frequent geyser. It's a good medium, according to the park ranger.
We left Yellowstone and headed to Bozeman, MT where we would stay the night.
No comments:
Post a Comment